CIA Iraq Iran-Contra

Ghosts of Iraq Policy Still Haunt State

he ghosts of Iraqgate glide about Foggy Bot-
tom and haunt the Clinton adminstration.

There’s April C. Glaspie, former ambassa-
dor to Baghdad who had been toiling away in obscu-
rity the last year or so in the U.S. mission at the
United Nations in an exceedingly low-profile job —
dealing with, environmental issues as a follow-up to
last June’s Rio Summit.

Glaspie was quietly minding her own business
theire until U.N. Ambassador Madeleine K. Albright
showed up one day in January and gave her five
hours to pack up and get out, according to a knowl-
edgeable source.

Now Glaspie is a diplomat without a job, doing
some work in the director general’s office. There
was talk of naming
her — at her sugges-
tion-sources say, to
the diplomatic (and
actual) equivalent of
the end of the Earth:
a job with the U.N.
operation in Har-
geysa, Somalia, the
northern part of the
country that was

hardly a garden spot even before the civil war dev-
astated the country.

Glaspie, who is also being considered for a job
inside the department, said yesterday she didn’t
know where she was going. “I’m here waiting for
reassignment. I would like to be abroad some-
where.” Surely not Hargeysa?

“I’d be happy to go there if someone wants to
send me,” Glaspie said.

Word’s out on another, albeit less radioactive,

Iraqgate veteran: James P. “Jock” Covey.

Covey was nominated by Bush to be assistant
secretary of state for South Asia — which the Senate
let die, apparently because of questions regarding
his work on Bush’s pre-Persian Gulf War policy.

The Clinton administration had him in line as an
assistant secretary for Defense, but that was derailed
by the same concerns. Now it appears Covey’s in line
for a deputy job at State under Robert L. Gallucci,
assistant secretary for politico military affairs.

The deputy job does not require Senate confirma-
tion, but there are rumblings on the Foreign Rela-
tions Committee that Covey will be blasted on Iraq
the minute he goes up to testify on any issue.